


complicated

by WattStalf



Category: Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: If | Fire Emblem: Fates
Genre: Childhood, F/M, Family, Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Pseudo-Incest, idk what this is tbh
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-11
Updated: 2017-02-11
Packaged: 2018-09-23 14:24:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,539
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9661190
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WattStalf/pseuds/WattStalf
Summary: Leo understands that he's complicated.





	

**Author's Note:**

> idk why I always thought I didn't care about Leo because honestly I have been doing a lot of his supports lately and I regret ever saying that because he is my ba by and i w ant him to be H APPPY  
> anyway here's a story about leo?????

Even when he is still so young that he can’t determine why, Leo knows that he likes his mother more when there are other people around. He doesn’t like the way her face looks different when they’re alone, or the way she rarely wants to listen to what he has to say. As he grows a bit, the differences become more noticeable, but he is still not yet old enough to understand some of the things she tells him when it’s just the two of them.

“You’re a worthless bastard,” she says. “You were supposed to make him love me.”

“Who doesn’t love you?” he asks her once, visibly concerned. However, he is not only concerned for her; he is starting to realize that he isn’t sure if he loves his own mother.

“Your father,” she replies. “Who else?”

“Father does love you,” he says, matter-of-factly. “He told me so. He loves you, and he loves me, and he loves big brother and his mother, and big sister and her mother.” Leo doesn’t make mention of the fact that Xander’s mother is gone, and that his father seems very sad whenever he talks about her.

“But he loves his whore of a wife most of all! I should have been queen, it should have been me.  _ You _ were supposed to make sure of that!”

They have conversations like this a lot, and Leo still doesn’t know what on earth he was supposed to do. He doesn’t know why his mother is so concerned with being the queen when his father tells him that he’s a prince either way, and he doesn’t know why she’s so different when she’s alone.

~X~

His mother likes to parade him in front of the other women, holding his hand and going on and on about how smart he is for his age, how well-behaved and sweet he can be, and if he holds back or doesn’t smile enough, it’s only because he’s so shy, but just look at how he lights up around his father! He doesn’t like it when she talks about him like this, or when she smiles at him or tells him she loves him, but he still likes her more like this then he does when they’re alone.

Sometimes, Xander will intervene, pulling him aside and asking him to train with him. Leo isn’t sure if he likes his older brother or not, but it’s always a relief to have an excuse to leave. His mother tells him that he should never upset Xander, that he’s their father’s favorite, but that he should always strive to be better than him, to become the favorite. He doesn't want to care so much, but whenever he has a chance to be the center of their father’s attention, he finds that he likes it so much that he can't help but compete with Xander.

~X~

It's Camilla who helps him understand one day, what it is that his mother means. She answers his questions when Xander brushes them off or tells him never to repeat the things his mother tells him behind closed doors.

“We’re both bastards,” she'll tell him, “though that really isn't a word you should say.”

“What does it  _ mean _ , though?” he asks impatiently. “And what about Xander?”

“No, Xander isn't. It means that our mothers weren't married to father,” she says.

“What about Azura?”

“Azura is...complicated.” They don't talk about their sister often, nor do they spend much time with her. She barely feels like a part of the family, most of the time.

“But her mother  _ is _ married to Father,” he says. “My mother says that her mother is a whore. Do you know what that means?”

“It means your mother is jealous,” is the only answer he ever gets from Camilla where that’s concerned, but it is still better than the way Xander brushes his questions off.

Leo does find it strange that he and Xander and Camilla all have different mothers and yet are meant to live and act like siblings should. He lives with his mother, and Camilla lives with her own- until she eventually passes- but he doesn’t know what Xander does. Perhaps he spends more time with their father.

And then there is Azura, who remains a complete mystery, despite being called one of his sisters.

~X~

Xander saves his life once when they’re children.

Leo is walking by himself when the woman strikes, one of the many women he’s seen flocking around his father, playing friendly with him and his mother. One of the women his mother talks poorly about when they are alone, one who does not have any children of her own. She comes at him and he doesn’t have a chance to react, to even see what she holds in her hand, before Xander comes running, shoving her to the ground.

He hadn’t even realized Xander was in the area, or even that this woman was, for that matter, but he had never thought that he had to be on guard around them to begin with. It is the first attempt on Leo’s life, but not the last, and soon enough, he’s able to defend himself well enough.

It’s because the women love his father, or so he’s told, and he supposes that’s the reason his mother is the way she is. Leo decides then that if that is what being in love makes people do, then he wants no part of it.

~X~

His mother dies not long after Elise is born, and not long before Corrin comes to live with them, and he isn’t sure, but she dies so suddenly that, even though he’s told it’s due to illness, he can’t help but suspect that one of her rivals poisoned her. He cares even less than he expected, and even though he is still young, he’s intelligent and he’s self-sufficient. There are servants to take care of him, and he has his older siblings to train with.

His father has become colder over time, torn up over the death of his wife, and perhaps even about the loss of Leo’s mother. It won’t be until a bit later that Leo really notices the change, and perhaps that is only because it’s so gradual. Or perhaps it is because he is distracted by Corrin.

She comes to live with them, but she doesn’t really. He and the others have a chance to meet her, but she is quickly sent away. She is, apparently, another of his sisters, but he doesn’t really understand where she came from or why he never met her before, and it is almost immediately after he meets her that Azura is taken away. That, at least, is something that Leo understands.

He doesn’t know how he feels about Corrin, who is sent to live somewhere else because they say she isn’t well. She seems healthy enough, but her memory is hazy at times, and Leo is told that she needs to be somewhere safe and secluded for the time being. He thinks of all the times attempts have been made on his life, and he wonders why  _ he _ was never protected like that; he thinks of the times his father was fun and affectionate, and he wonders why everything keeps changing.

Sometimes, he is sent to visit Corrin, along with Xander and Camilla, and Elise, when she is old enough. Though there is a part of him that doesn’t care for this sister that appeared out of nowhere at the time when everything in his life began to change, she is always so kind to him.

The others all adore her, in their own way. Camilla dotes on her constantly, saying that she needs all the affection she can get while she’s locked away like this, and Elise looks up to her and doesn’t know what it was like before she came along anyway. Xander, who becomes more stiff and distant as he grows, always trying to live up to his image as the heir to the throne, softens up for her, and goes so easy on her.

Leo wants to hate her more than anything. It’s hard not to blame her for the way doesn’t look at him anymore, and it’s hard not to resent her for the way Xander and Camilla seem to favor her, for the way Elise looks at her like she holds all the answers to the world. He is used to competing with Xander, to being jealous of him, to striving to find his way out of his older brother’s shadow, but his relationship with Corrin never makes sense.

Whenever she smiles at him, or asks him what he’s been reading, or tells him that she admires something about him, he wants to lash out at her, or to strike her, or to do  _ something _ to show her that he doesn’t  _ like _ her. He doesn’t like the way things seem to come so easy to her while he always feels so very isolated.

“What’s your mother like?” he asks her once, when the two of them are alone.

“I don’t remember,” she replies with a troubled expression.

“You’re probably better off,” he says coldly. But then he thinks about the fact that she wouldn’t remember if their father were ever kind to her, like he used to be to Leo, and even if she could remember everything, there might not be any memories like that. Maybe she never knew him before he changed, and then Leo catches himself feeling sorry for her, and he hates it.

He hates everything about her, but he cares for her all the same, and the only thing that is ever clear to him is that he never counts her as one of his sisters; he never cares for her the way he does for Camilla, or even Elise.

~X~

They all grow up, growing into very different people, but Leo never feels like he changes all that much. He grows in intelligence and skill, but he is always following after Xander, unable to catch up, and the words of his long dead mother still echo in his mind, even though he’d rather not remember a thing she said to him. Corrin is always somewhere on his mind, making things more complicated for him.

Everything around him always changes, but he never really does.

~X~

The biggest change comes when Corrin is taken from them, and when she learns the truth of her birth. Leo never knew the whole truth; no one ever saw reason to tell him, but he’s suspected for some time that she might have been adopted- or perhaps he wanted her to be, since he had such a hard time seeing her as a sister.

Whatever the case, learning that she’s adopted isn’t a surprise. It’s learning that she’s Hoshidan royalty, and that she wasn’t so much kidnapped as taken away, that Azura was taken in retaliation. And she learns this and she is given a choice, and he wants her to come home just as much as the others do, and for the first time, he feels no pangs of jealousy when Xander or Camilla or Elise speak to her. All he wants is for her to agree to come home.

No matter how he may feel about Corrin, no matter how conflicted he may be, no matter how he wants to hate her, and no matter how hard it is to hate her, he knows that he absolutely does not want to lose her to anyone. Leo doesn’t have words to express the relief he feels when she agrees to come home with them, or the confusion that follows this new wave of emotions.

~X~

Being in love makes one do awful things, or at least, that’s always been the way Leo’s seen it. He remembers the way his own mother used him, and the way the women fought over his father, the way his father could never turn away a woman, the way he fell to pieces upon losing any of them, he remembers the way Elise’s mother ignored her to the very end. Always, he’s promised himself that he won’t fall in love, that he won’t allow himself to turn into the sort of person capable of doing those things.

And, truly, he doesn’t know anything about love. He doesn’t know how to express it or what forms it can take, or what it might be like if it were more positive. Despite all this, despite his lack of knowledge, despite the fact that he never wants to give in to such emotions, there is nothing he can do now to deny it.

He doesn’t know how long he’s been in love with Corrin, or what is going to happen now that he knows he is, but he is. Leo is in love with her, and she may still see him as a brother, or she may not care for him nearly as much as he lets on, and whatever the case, he is terrified. He is terrified of what might happen and who he might become, and who she might become, should she return his feelings.

He is terrified, but when they’re brought back together, he can’t keep away from her, and he can’t turn her away when she comes to him for her help. Even when he tries to be cruel to her or push her away, she is always there, kind as ever, and he knows that it’s completely hopeless. He wants her in his life more than anything, even as a part of him continues to resent her for being everything that he wishes he could be.

~X~

Leo understands that he’s complicated. He knows that it can’t be helped, what with how he was raised, and he knows that his feelings will always be complicated. Since childhood, he has resented Xander, despite caring about him, and he has resented Camilla, and he has resented Elise, all because he was afraid he would never be good enough.

He loves Corrin, but that love is so tangled up with his resentment for her, and his jealousy and his confusion and his need to be cared for, and he doesn’t know if he will ever sort that out. Leo understands that he’s complicated, and that he will always be complicated, and this his feelings will never make sense. He is not sure enough of anything to reach out to Corrin, and he is not ready to express his feelings to her, and yet…

And yet, somehow, she gets it out of him. She’s always had her way of getting what she wants from him and from their siblings, and she gets him to confess even when he isn’t sure if he’s able to love her the way she deserves. Leo will always be complicated, but Corrin says that she doesn’t mind, and promises to be by his side from now on, doing what she can to help him sort things out.

He isn’t sure if his love is positive enough, if it’s good enough, but there’s no doubt in his mind that the way she loves him could never be bad.


End file.
